Customize your visits to Web sites

June 13, 1999

BY HEATHER NEWMAN
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

THE WORLD Wide Web is getting smaller -- in one way, at least.

Numerous sites have taken steps to let you customize what you see on-screen when you visit. That makes the amount of unwanted material you have to slog through on a page shrink dramatically.

If you aren't using these custom tools, you should be. Here's how:

First, pick an entry point onto the Web. Your browser's home page -- or the Internet site you see when you first start up -- can be changed to whatever address you'd like -- say, http://www.freep.com/ to make the Free Press home page your starting point.

But don't stop there. You can customize your view of individual information pages.

For instance, do you want REALLY detailed local weather? Visit the Weather Channel at http://www.weather.com/ and click on Customize Your Home Page. You can set what cities you'll see, what maps you'll get, you name it.

Or if you're an eBay addict, you can see all the items you've bid on (or are selling), your feedback and even links to your favorite categories of items up for auction. Head to http://www.ebay.com/ and click on Buyers, then on My Ebay.

Time savers

You may have noticed that visits to technical support pages at sophisticated sites like Microsoft's result in automatically customized pages. The site uses so-called cookies to remember what you searched for the last time you came by and stands prepared to show you that kind of information on that topic or program again.

There's even a tool to assist you if you don't want to customize what pages show you, but rather what pages you see. QuickBrowse at http://www.quickbrowse.com/ will save lists of Web addresses and send you the actual pages, collected together into a single E-mail, as often as you like.

The links will work, you'll see the pictures, and you won't have to hop from page to page because they all will be in a single piece of mail. If you'd rather see them put together on the Web than in your E-mail box, you can do that at the site.

Many banks and brokerages now offer custom pages for their customers that show real-time account information (protected by a secure server and a password). Ask your credit card company, broker and banker what they can offer.

Web portals like My Yahoo! at my.yahoo.com gather information and let you customize how it appears on screen.

PC donation update

We got a flood of responses from folks who wanted to donate their PCs to agencies in need. There were also a few responses from people whose computers didn't get matched with those agencies. The machines might be of help to someone else.

Drop me a line if you know of a certified nonprofit agency that could use the following: a variety of older Apple computers, including the IIe, IIsi, Centris 610 and Quadra 610; a selection of 286 and 386 IBM-compatible PCs; a few older 8088-style IBM compatible computers (some with hard drives); and a pseudo-computer, a Brother WP-3400 word processor, including personal finance software, ribbons and typing paper.

In addition, some folks have parts to donate. Those include some spare printers (IBM and Apple) and 20 Compaq IBM-compatible 14- and 15-inch monitors. Nonprofit organizations that can provide donors with tax letters or receipts, please call or E-mail me to request these items.

HEATHER NEWMAN can be reached at 1-313-223-3336, at newman@freepress.com or by visiting www.freep.com/tech/pcathome